1. Field of the Invention
Aspects of the present invention relate to a battery management system. More particularly, aspects of the present invention relate to a battery management system for a vehicle using electric energy, and a driving method thereof.
2. Description of the Related Art
Vehicles using internal combustion engines with gasoline or diesel fuel pollute the environment through the burning of fossil fuels which produces air pollution. In order to reduce such pollution, there have been many attempts to develop an electric or a hybrid vehicle.
The electric vehicle is a vehicle using an electric motor that is driven by electrical energy produced from a battery. Such an electric vehicle does not produce exhaust gas and produces very little noise because the electric vehicle uses a battery pack formed of a plurality of rechargeable battery cells as a power source.
The hybrid vehicle is a vehicle that uses both an internal combustion engine and an electric motor. That is, hybrid vehicles use at least two power sources, for example, an internal combustion engine and a battery engine. Currently, hybrid vehicles have been developed to use an internal combustion engine with a fuel cell or use a battery with a fuel cell such that the fuel cell generates electrical energy through a chemical reaction, to which hydrogen and oxygen are continuously applied.
In order to enhance the power of a vehicle using a battery engine, the number of rechargeable battery cells has increased. The vehicle using the battery engine requires a battery management system (BMS) with a cell balancing control method to effectively manage a plurality of battery cells connected to each other.
Particularly, a control unit of the BMS is required to have more input and output ports as the number of the battery cells increases. Accordingly, the manufacturing cost of the control unit becomes increased, and the control unit occupies a larger area in the BMS.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and therefore it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known in this country to a person of ordinary skill in the art.